Information Processing and Information Systems: Year In Review 1993

Originally published in the Britannica Book of the Year. Presented as archival content. Learn more.

This article was originally published in the Britannica Book of the Year, an annual print publication that
provides an overview of the year’s most-notable people and events.
Unlike most articles on Britannica.com, Book of the Year articles are not reviewed and revised after their initial publication.
Rather, they are presented on the site as archival content, intended for historical reference only.

The world of computing got smaller in 1993 in terms of both new ultrasmall computing systems and the downsizing of giant computer corporations. Yet for all its shrinkage, the computing industry also reached out in a big way. The new, small computers were equipped with wireless networking systems, and home and office computers were offered the promise of networking with other computers nationwide on a "data superhighway."

Technology

This reaching out also occurred on the software level. One of the most popular programs for the IBM personal computer (PC) and its compatible machines was Lotus Development Corp.’s Notes, a new version of which was marketed in 1993. Notes is a "groupware" product, allowing groups of employees on a network, for instance, to produce a report jointly. Windows for Workgroups, a version of the popular Windows software, also debuted during the year, and there were plans for groupware that would link people working in their homes.

Another popular new product of 1993 also promoted connections between PC users. Named for its designer--the personal computer memory card industry association--the PCMCIA card was about the size of a business card and about 10 times as thick. When inserted into a special slot in a pocket-size computer, such as the Hewlett-Packard 95LX, it provided the PC with special functions such as extra memory. With a small radio built into it, a pocket computer could communicate with other pocket PCs or with local area networks (LANs). A PCMCIA card for the latter function was announced during the year by Proxim, Inc.; the card’s speed was 40 times slower than that of most LANs.

While pocket computers were not new in 1993, a new type of handheld PC was introduced. Called the personal digital assistant (PDA), this palm-size computer was notable for having no keyboard. Instead, users wrote on its plastic screen with a special pen, and software then converted the handwriting to type. PDAs were introduced in 1993 by AT&T, Tandy Corp., and Apple Computer Inc., which called its product the Newton.

One problem with these PDAs was that there was no standard pen-based operating system; therefore, they could not interchange software as could standard PCs. Another consideration was that, because they were battery-operated and inexpensive—Apple’s Newton started at about $700—they did not have the processing power needed to keep up with fast writers or to translate their writing with perfect accuracy. Still another hurdle for PDAs was that there was no way to route the messages they created through the nation’s computer networks. However, a consortium called General Magic, which included Apple and Sony Corp., announced that it was developing the software needed to accomplish this.

The best way to send messages from a PDA or any portable computer is without connecting any wires at all. The few means available to do this were expensive, but during the year the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) created "personal communications service," a cellular-like scheme having frequencies that could be used for wireless data links.

Business

While connectivity was the major theme in computer hardware, the theme for the business of computers was continued upheaval. In fact, the year’s biggest business story may have been the nearly $5 billion loss reported by IBM Corp., the largest corporate loss ever. In its aftermath, IBM’s longtime chairman, John Akers, was replaced by Louis Gerstner, Jr., the former chairman of RJR Nabisco. (See BIOGRAPHIES.) At Apple longtime chairman John Sculley was replaced by Michael Spindler, the company’s former chief of European operations, while Shigechika Takeuchi, president of Apple’s Japanese subsidiary, resigned in November.

IBM’s primary line of business was mainframe computers. From 1990 to 1992, however, its share of the world mainframe market dropped from 58% to 52%. IBM’s 1993 financial statement revealed that the corporation’s mainframe revenue had declined 12% and that all hardware sales were off 20%.

Another corporate crisis took place at NeXT Computer, Inc., a firm launched in 1985 by Apple cofounder Steve Jobs. Poor sales of its sole product, a workstation for education and engineering, caused the company to cease production and lay off about half of its 2,800 employees.

Also reporting a major loss was Borland International, Inc., once expected to be the third player in a PC software triumvirate with Microsoft Corp. and Lotus Development Corp. Borland experienced a third-quarter decline of $63 million and laid off 15% of its 2,200-employee workforce. It also began selling its financial analysis software for about $100, a fifth of the price of similar programs from Microsoft and Lotus.

Not every information-industry company shrank in 1993. AT&T decided to merge with the nation’s largest independent cellular company, McCaw Cellular. And, in the largest U.S. communications merger ever, Bell Atlantic, a regional Bell telephone company, announced that it would buy cable television conglomerate TCI, Inc., which owned 1,200 local networks, for $21 billion. Bell Atlantic did not plan to operate the TCI networks within its own service area, but it would be allowed to use TCI lines outside its region to carry telephone calls. This would put it in competition with other "Baby Bells," a development the U.S. Department of Justice had not envisioned when it forced the breakup of AT&T in the early 1980s.

The proposed Bell Atlantic/TCI merger demonstrated how the computer and telecommunications businesses were merging. Cable TV by 1993 was capable of serving 95% of U.S. homes and businesses, and during the year it also became a medium for carrying corporate computer data, thanks to a new technology developed by Digital Equipment Corp.

As a result, cable TV companies could compete with telephone companies, which in turn wanted to get into the cable TV business in order to finance the laying of fibre-optic cable to homes. Unlike the copper-wire phone network, fibre-optic cable could carry movies and hundreds of television channels.

The Bell Atlantic/TCI merger would create the sort of "data superhighway" that the U.S. government was championing as a means to reduce costs in such industries as health care. According to one estimate, improved telecommunications would save the health-care industry $36 billion a year. Such a network could also be used to connect students with remote databases. The government wanted private industry to build the data superhighway, but it did plan to invest in research and development and to ease the market restrictions that might otherwise prevent a merger such as Bell Atlantic’s.

Already the regulatory barriers were crumbling. In 1992 the FCC began allowing phone companies to carry information services such as dial-up versions of want ads, which a home computer could search in seconds by looking for key words.

Networks

The planned fibre-optic network would not be the first offered by phone companies to improve data communications between homes and small businesses. In 1993 an integrated services digital network (ISDN) was being installed throughout the U.S. using the copper-wire network. ISDN allowed a home computer to send and receive information at rates 10 times faster than the fastest home computer modems, and one consumer group claimed that it offered 80% of what fibre-optic networks would offer but at 10% of the cost. The telephone industry said its ISDN installations were going faster than expected and that by the end of 1994, 62% of lines would have the service, not the 55% it had expected by then.

Another existing computer network caught the public imagination in 1993. Noncommercial in nature and without any central management or, for the most part, funding, Internet was simply a linkup of diverse computer networks, most of them academic or research institutions. In 1993, however, publication after publication, including Harper’s magazine, featured stories on the electronic mail (E-mail) sent back and forth in Internet’s specialized forums--electronic bulletin boards that focused on everything from AIDS research to stamp collecting. One reason Internet was gaining popularity was that several software companies introduced programs in 1993 to make it easier to use, and several on-line information services opened gateways into this "network of networks."

As networking spread, it was likely to bring about changes in how the public thought about electronic versions of what was now received on paper. In what might someday be seen as a landmark case, a federal judge ruled during the year that E-mail generated by the U.S. president’s office is as much a historical record as paper documents and cannot be erased when an administration changes.

Developments in Japan

The year 1992 was a difficult one for computer manufacturers and software houses in Japan because of a combination of saturated international markets and the prolonged recession. The production of computers and related equipment in 1992 (January-December) amounted to 5,616,700,000,000 yen, a 7.7% decrease from 6,083,400,000,000 yen in 1991.

Investment in information equipment declined especially sharply in the financial and security industries, but this belt-tightening mood also spread to manufacturing. Most vendors predicted little or no recovery in 1993. According to the statistics based on the Ministry of International Trade and Industry’s New Survey on Computers Deliveries, the total number of deliveries of computers in 1992 was 2,712,505, and the value of the deliveries was 3,794,300,000 yen. Both the numbers and the value of the deliveries decreased from the preceding year.

Included in this survey were all types of hardware--general-purpose computers, minicomputers, office computers and distributed processing processors, workstations, and PCs. In terms of the value of the deliveries, general-purpose computers ranked first with a 48.1% share, followed by personal computers (24.7%), and office computers/distributed processing processors (13.8%).

According to a survey by JEIDA (Japan Electronic Industry Development Association), the shipment of personal computers in fiscal 1991 totaled 2,310,000 in terms of central processing units, down 13.2% from the preceding year. They totaled 1,172,900,000,000 yen in monetary value, down 7.1%. Influenced by the worsening economic environment, shipments decreased from the previous year for the first time since the survey began in fiscal 1981.